Spotlight dazzles on road back to anonymity

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Left to right: 'In a case like this, you are looking for a smoking gun; something you can grab on to. In this case, we had trouble finding that.' Juror 1
'I think we all just looked at the evidence and pretty much agreed.'Juror 5, a 79-year-old grandmother with a registered sex offender for a grandson.'I've lost a lot of sleep over this. A lot of us have. I made 19 new friends out of this.' Juror 7

They included a 79-year-old grandmother who enjoys a good game
of bridge, a 21-year-old who deliberated from a wheelchair and a
45-year-old mother of three who worked in a supermarket.

By their own admission on Monday, jurors in the Michael Jackson
child molestation case came from modest, anonymous backgrounds
before they suddenly felt the "weight of the world's eyes" on them.
It was a moment that reduced several of them to tears.

Poring over 98 pages of jury instructions and taking notes until
their hands went numb, jurors said they examined every piece of
evidence and set aside personal feelings about Jackson and his
behaviour. As troubling as it was to some, jurors said they stuck
purely to the facts.

They issued a statement asking that they be allowed to return to
"our private lives as anonymous as we came," but that anonymity may
be impossible to find. As they piled out of a sheriff's van and
headed to their own cars, an army of television "bookers" showered
them with free plane tickets, hotel rooms, meals and limousine
rides if they agreed to appear on the next morning's news
programs.

Juror Mike Stevens, 21, of Santa Maria, had already agreed to
appear on ABC, NBC and CBS before he rolled his wheelchair to his
front door.

But the notoriety of the case and the intense media focus were
the least of their concerns during the 14-week trial, jurors said.
"It really didn't bother us that much," juror Melissa Herard
said.

What the panel found far more difficult to deal with were the
inquiries of spouses and friends, long sleepless nights and the
gruelling pace of the proceedings. Jurors said they never
anticipated they would come to an agreement on Monday and the shock
of the decision caused some to weep in court.

"It was very emotional," said Ms Herard, 42, a mother of four.
"It's like a no-win situation for everyone in both families," she
said, but also because the verdict marked the end of a close and
intense relationship with fellow jurors.

"I just realised that it's done and it's over and we can now go
on with our lives," she said.

In the end, juror Raymond Hultman and jury foreman Paul
Rodriguez said the prosecution's case never fully added up. Jurors
said they reviewed the evidence in detail, but never found the
"smoking gun".

"We were required to look at some very specific counts in this
case," Mr Hultman said. "One of the counts wasn't that Michael
Jackson was guilty of sleeping with boys or that he was guilty of
having adult material in his home."

Repeatedly, jurors said they were puzzled why certain evidence
was presented. Such was the case with fingerprints lifted from
pornographic magazines.

"We went through a lot of fingerprints," Mr Rodriguez said.

"But again, the fingerprints had a lot not to do with the case
because those are adult magazines and anyone can own them . . . It
doesn't prove the charge."

Panel members said they found testimony from the accuser's
mother unconvincing and her manner distasteful. They particularly
took issue with her snapping her fingers at the jury and insisting
at one point that an image had been burned into her head.

"She said a lot of things that . . . came on very strong," said
juror Pauline Coccoz, a 45-year-old mother of three.

Mr Rodriguez, 63, was similarly put off by her demeanour. He
recalled one moment when the woman addressed the jury and looked
into his eyes and said, with a wink, "you know how our culture is".
The accuser and his mother were Latino, like Mr Rodriguez.